Agris helmet
| Agris helmet | |
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| Information | |
| Weapon type: | Protective weapon |
| Designations: | Agris helmet |
| Use: | Magnificent helmet |
| Creation time: | 4th century BC Chr. |
| Region of origin / originator: |
France |
| Distribution: | France |
| Lists on the subject | |
The helmet of Agris is a gilded Celtic representation helmet of the 4th century BC , which was found 1981 in the Grotte des Perrats near Agris in the French department Charente , region Nouvelle-Aquitaine .
Discovery story
The helmet of Agris, French Casque d'Agris , was discovered in the Grotte des Perrats in 1981. Access to the cave itself had only been known for over a week when cave explorers recovered two connected front parts of the helmet on May 9 and 10, 1981 could. They were stuck in the ejecta of a badger burrow in the central area of the cave. As a result, an excavation team was quickly set up to explore the cave. They found remains of gold foil , two fragments that joined together to form a larger triangle, and the actual helmet. Except for the part separated from the badger, the helmet was in very good condition.
There were also indications that the cave had been used as early as the Mesolithic , the Bronze Age , the Iron Age , the Gallo-Roman epoch and into the Middle Ages . In the 13th or 14th century, the entrance collapsed so that access to the cave was closed. At the time of the find, almost all parts of the helmet had been affected by burrowing animals. In 1983, the cheek protection and three ornament fragments that came from the side of the helmet were found during renewed excavations . Further fragments several meters away from the site where the helmet was found came to light in 1986, including the base of the helmet tip. They had obviously been shipped there by badgers or humans. The second cheek protection and the decoration of the helmet tip have not yet been discovered.
The French state bought the finds from the landowner. The helmet was then restored by Laszlo von Lehóczky at the Roman-Germanic Central Museum in Mainz . It is now kept in the Musée d'Angoulême in Angoulême . The helmet is considered one of the masterpieces of Celtic art and has already been shown at various international exhibitions. It even appears in a band dessinée from 2005 under the title “Le casque d'Agris” .
Cultural context
New excavations in 2002 showed that the cave entrance was surrounded by an adobe wall and a moat. The cave probably served as a sanctuary until the early Roman Empire . The helmet is an isolated single find that was deliberately left in the cave - there are no indications of a human burial. During its filing, some of its external decorations were broken off and placed inside the helmet. The storage location had been carefully chosen. Its discoverers believe that the helmet may represent a votive offering to the spirits of the underworld. According to Roman sources, the Celtic warriors did not wear helmets. The Agris helmet must therefore have had a purely ceremonial function to show the high rank of its wearer.
description
The Agris helmet measures 21.4 centimeters in height and 23 × 19 centimeters in width, the corresponding cheek protector 9.4 × 7.6 centimeters. It is sometimes compared to a jockey helmet, but the visor is actually a neck protector. Inside the helmet there is an iron hat , but it has now rusted heavily. The monkshood is forged from a single piece. The neck protection was firmly attached to the helmet - and not riveted, as is often falsely claimed. The inner monkshood is completely covered by bronze ribbons , the bas-reliefs of which were either cast or chased . The four horizontal bronze bands are in turn completely covered with gold foil on the outside. The decorations incorporate cabochons made of shaped and polished precious coral .
All of the decorative reliefs had been placed on the bronze strips before the gold leaf was applied. The gold leaf, only around 70 μ thick, was pressed over the decorative reliefs with a tool made of wood or bone. The grooves and imitation filigree in the bronze were enough to hold the gold leaf in place. The precious coral cabochons were attached to the bronze with silver rivets , the heads of which are decorated with diamond or palm leaf motifs. Occasionally the receiving indentations were also lined with gold before the cabochon was attached. Ample gold leaf was then placed around the cabochon, creating a small cup-like structure around the stone.
The cheek protection is forged very neatly. The same materials and techniques were used for it as for the helmet. There are also indications that wood and leather are used.
Ornaments
Agris's helmet is richly decorated with palmettes . Many of the palmettes and rivets are filled with precious coral. The ornaments based on plant patterns form an arrangement of three superimposed bands. Due to its varied ornaments, the helmet is likely to be one of the richest Celtic objects of art.
A row of disconnected palmettes is formally arranged as friezes in the lower and upper bands. The ornamentation of the middle band is based on an arrangement of S-shaped curves that terminate in swelling leaves. The curves are filled with palmettes, leaves with the same commas and intersecting tendrils. On the neck guard, the patterns are less formal and much more fluid. The cheek protection has a palmette pattern with a curled, horned snake. Horned snakes appear quite often in Roman Celtic art objects in Great Britain and France, but are very rare in the early La Tène period . There may be a special reason for this motif of the Agris helmet.
Stylistic assignment
The design of the inner monkshood shows similarities with a number of helmet finds from the Central Alps. The bronze stripe coating is reminiscent of Italian Montefortino-type helmets . The palmettes create a stylistic connection to the early La Tène period. Most of the motifs used either belong directly to the first western style group of the Latène culture or are derivatives thereof. However, some of the motifs have affinities to the intermediate group of the Waldalgesheim style .
The ornamentation essentially reflects the early style of Celtic art from the 5th century BC, but some of the motifs are characteristic of the Waldalgesheim style of the 4th century BC. The middle band has similarities with motifs on Waldalgesheim bracelets - and thus moves the time of manufacture of the helmet to the first half of the 4th century BC. The large seven-leaf palmettes in the lower band and the main frieze in the middle band may have been influenced by central Italian, Tyrrhenian terracotta from the 5th and 4th centuries BC. The neck protection combines Waldalgesheim style elements with Greek or Etruscan art of the 4th century BC. Chr.
Decoration on the neck protection
Decoration of the lower band
Decoration of the middle band
Decoration of the upper band
Emergence
For the place of origin of the Agris helmet, three areas of the Celtic world of that time are being considered:
- the north or central Adriatic region of Italy
- the northern alpine region
- the region of the site in western France.
The plant patterns speak for Italy. These are believed to have been developed by Celtic craftsmen who settled in Italy and who in turn were in direct contact with Etruscan or Greek artists. The complexity in assembly and ornamentation is explained by the proximity of leading metalworking centers such as in Taranto or Campania .
The materials, techniques, overall impression and ornamentation used speak for the northern Alpine region - the former center of Celtic culture. The conical tip of the helmet is evidently derived from the Celtic helmets from the beginning of the second Iron Age , which were native to the northern Alps . These show - if ornamented - superimposed ribbons. Some details of the plant decorations resemble patterns found in Austria, the Alps and western Switzerland.
The third possibility is, of course, that the helmet was made near where it was found. This is supported by the fact that it belongs to a small series of representative helmets that were discovered in western France. An example of this is the fully ornate helmet from Amfreville-sous-les-Monts in the Eure department . All of these helmets were made of an iron or bronze hat covered with ribbons of a different metal. Furthermore, they all have red decorative stones, mainly made of precious coral.
Used gold
Gold samples from various helmet parts reveal an exceptionally high degree of purity, typically 99 percent gold, 0.5 percent silver and 0.2 percent copper . This very high degree of purity is quite rare for ancient finds. Analyzes of Greek or Etruscan gold objects from this era show a significantly higher silver content. Objects with such a high degree of purity were found southwest of the Loire - in an area where Agris is also located. The only comparable art objects belong to Celtic jewelry of the 3rd century BC, which comes from the same region. It is possible that the helmet was made in the west, although the craftsmen who carried it out had received their training in the North Alpine School . The gold probably came from gold mines in the western Massif Central ( Limousin ) that had existed since the 5th century BC .
Age
The Agris helmet is undoubtedly from the early La Tène period. Its gold leaf is of a very high degree of purity. The helmet may represent one of the earliest high-quality gold objects in Europe. However, compared to other high-ranking metalwork from the Latène period, it was found very far in the west. Similar items in France come from Amfreville-sous-les-Monts in Normandy , from Saint-Jean-Trolimon in Brittany, and from Montlaurès near Narbonne . Another site in Italy is Canosa di Puglia in Apulia .
The exact age of the Agris helmet is still a matter of dispute among archaeologists. José Gomez De Soto (2001) advocates the middle or second half of the 4th century BC. However, in the same stratigraphic association too appeared LT B belonging fibula of Dux type . DW Harding therefore recommends that the manufacture of the helmet be established in the late 4th century BC. In their work from 2010, the ornamentation of the helmet as a whole leads Gomez de Soto and Stephane Verger to conclude that it was made during the second quarter or in the middle of the 4th century BC, i.e. shortly before 350 BC. Chr.
literature
- José Gomez de Soto and Pierre-Yves Milcent among others: La France du Center aux Pyrénées (Aquitaine, Center, Limousin, Midi-Pyrénées, Poitou-Charentes): Cultes et sanctuaires en France à l'âge du Fer . In: Gallia . vol. 3, t. 60, no 1, 2003, p. 107-138 , doi : 10.3406 / galia.2003.3145 .
- Martin A. Guggisberg: Le casque d'Agris (France), vers -350 av. J.-C. In: L'Archéologue / Archeologie Nouvelle . no 103, 2009, p. 51 .
- Ulrich Schaaff: Celtic helmets. Antique helmets. In: Lipperheide Collection and other holdings of the Antikenmuseum Berlin . Roman-Germanic Central Museum, Mainz 1988, p. 293-317 .
Individual evidence
- ^ DW Harding: The Archeology of Celtic Art . Routledge, 2007, ISBN 978-1-134-26464-3 .
- ↑ a b Christiane Eluère, Jose Gomez de Soto and Alain-René Duval: Un chef-d'œuvre de l'orfèvrerie celtique: le casque d'Agris (Charente) . In: Bulletin de la Société Préhistorique Française . tape 84 (1) , 1987.
- ^ J. Gomez: Nouvelles découvertes exceptionnelles de la Tène ancienne dans la grotte d'Agris, Charente . In: Bulletin de la Société Préhistorique Française . tape 80 (7) , 1983, pp. 194-197 .
- ^ A b José Gomez De Soto and Stephane Verger: Le casque d'Agris, chef-d'oeuvre de l'art celtique occidental . In: L'Archéologue . 2010.
- ^ A b John T. Koch and Antone Minard: The Celts: History, Life, and Culture . In: ABC-CLIO . 2012, ISBN 978-1-59884-964-6 .
- ↑ Silvio Luccisano: Le casque d'Agris, tome 1: Le sanctuaire interdit . Assor BD, 2005, ISBN 978-2-9516660-5-4 .
- ^ Christiane Eluère: Two Unique Golden Helmets . In: Gold Bulletin . tape 17 (3) , 1984, pp. 110-111 , doi : 10.1007 / BF03216577 .
- ↑ José Gomez de Soto: Moons north-alpine et / ou méditerranée? Actualités de l'art celtique de Gaule de l'ouest (Ve -IVe s. Av. J.-C.) . In: Revue Archéologique, Nouvelle Série . tape 1 (1) , 2001, p. 212-218 .